The Disneyfication of Children’s Culture ANIMATING YOUTH The Disneyfication of Children’s Culture

QUESTION What’s your first impression about Disneyland?

Children culture Children’s culture is a sphere where entertainment, advocacy, and pleasure meet to construct conceptions of what it means to be a child occupying a combination of gender, racial, and class positions in society that one defines oneself through in relation to a myriad of others.

Typical traits of Disney “intact white middle-class family” “erase complex issues, culture difference and social struggles.” Not the same as we perceived before.

What’s real Disney Disney has prosecuted violations of his copyrights law and has a legendary reputation for bullying. EX “south Florida day-care centers”

What’s real Disneyland Disney shapes children’s experiences through a maze of representations and products found in every aspects of our lives. EX：movies scholarships school

What’s real Disneyland Fantasy and Real “Disneyland is there to conceal the fact that it is the real country, all of real America.”

Problems Collapse boundaries Turn kids into consumers Lose critical analysis Perfect illusions Disney’s corporate and culture role influence is to enormous and far-reaching to allow it to define itself exclusively within the imaginary discourse of innocence, civic pride, and entertainment.

Real movie Gender identities Racism The Little Mermaid(1998) Beauty and Beast(1991) The Lion King(1994) Aladdin(1992)

Discussion How do you think of Disneyland now? What should people react to the problems?

Solution First, Disney’s popular culture should be taken seriously and critically. Second, public must be attentive to the multiple and diverse messages in Disney films. Third, cultural workers and educators need to insert the political and pedagogical back into the discourse of entertainment. Forth, we should analyze Disney within a broad and complex range of power relations.

Summary Disney empire should actively engage in culture landscaping of national identity and the “schooling” of the mind of young children as a pedagogical and policy-making enterprise. We should not ignore the challenge and the struggle of reading Disney’s film critically.